Go Big or Go Bust: New Efficiency Model - Sundance A Cautionary Tale (Part 5)

In November, we left for Toyonaka outside of Osaka, ‘the business capital’ of Japan.  Normally I would have been a nervous wreck, figuring that I’d lose myself, my focus and any film momentum I might have gathered now that I’d be a faculty wife in exile in suburban Japan.  But with my new status as a successful filmmaker with a feature in competition at Sundance, nothing could stop me.  Or so I thought.

Lea Floden as Louise with Michael Moneagle and William Zimmer

From the minute we arrived in Japan until the day we left, my love for our lodging, the Guest House of Osaka University, its minimalist architecture and heated floors, never diminished.  On the contrary, the charm of my new social situation wore off faster than the jet lag.  

Mr. Green came home from his first day at the lab, his eyebrows raised, “These people work twelve to fourteen hours a day!  I’m not going to get into that.  I want to enjoy you and Frank and our time here.”  I raised my inner eyebrows.

Within the week Mr. Green was working twelve hour days.  Hey, I’m not a pathetic person clinging to her husband’s arm, I’ve got stuff to do too.  I’d soon be leaving for Sundance!  I set out to lock in a babysitter a few afternoons a week so I could collect my thoughts before setting off on the festival circuit.  

At eleven months, Frank was a terror on all fours.  He knew he wasn’t allowed in the refrigerator but as soon as its door swung open, he’d dash over at his top speed crawl, lace little fingers between the wires of a shelf and pull himself up to standing, shrieking with delight.  For extra fun, he’d grab things off the shelves and hurl them into the room.  

My first inquiries about getting some relief were to narrow-minded traditional types who tipped their heads to the side and screwed up their faces.  “Babysitta?  In Japan, babies stay with mother.  Or grandmother.”  Seriously? I thought to myself.  Get a life.  Weeks into my search for a few hours of relief, I realized that I was up against something a whole lot bigger than I’d ever be.  According to everyone I asked (this was 1989) I would not find anyone willing to watch the kid if I scoured the entire country.  Peoples’ best suggestions were that I take him to Baby And Me Swim classes.  I’d meet other mothers, too!

I turned to dark chocolate and more and more coffee trying to bring my energy up so I could make do on less sleep, getting something done while old Frank recharged his batteries.  Unfortunately, the stimulating effect reversed and made me more tired than ever.  

Heck, I figured, what’s there to do to ‘get ready’ anyway?  We didn’t have the budget for a publicist.  Lea Floden would join me in Park City and we’d do the best we could.

One month before setting off for Sundance (and dropping Frank at his grandparents in New Jersey) I started giving him more bottles of baby formula and weaning him from nursing.  He was eleven months old and though I’d loved this incredibly tender and intimate part of motherhood, it had to end in order for me to go to Sundance alone.  A measured tapering off would spare both of us the misery of going cold turkey.  One afternoon, watching his beautiful profile, peaceful and confident as he nursed, he pulled off my breast and looked up into my eyes, his mouth full of milk. He cooed at me with such love, the memory of it is a high point of my life.  

Note to filmmakers who haven’t been to Park City: before you go, read up on how to prevent altitude sickness.  “Headache, fatigue, nausea, loss of appetite, shortness of breath … the common symptoms of mild altitude sickness can be similar to a bad hangover.”  I knew about this and I thought I took precautions.  Maybe I didn’t do enough.

In Park City the festival organized for me to stay in a condo with other filmmakers. They all seemed to know each other and to sleep in ripped t-shirts. I remember one of them looking me over in disbelief (and what felt like hostility) in my nightgown and housecoat. Here I’d made it to Sundance and now was going to feel alienated … because I wore a nightgown?

Jet-lagged, with the altitude sickness and now feeling ostracized by my immediate peers, I wasn’t in top form to face the career opportunity of my life.  Legendary PR man Mickey Cottrell and Doug Lindeman and I exchanged cards on the bus to a screening and Mickey said he’d heard good buzz about How To Be Louise.  Claudia Lewis, young, hip and smart, sat in front of Lea and me at a screening.  She’d worked on Drugstore Cowboy.  She encouraged us to stay in touch.  

Pretty much the rest of the festival is a blur.  There were parties.  There were lots and lots of people all of whom I knew i should at least be trying to connect with.  But how do you do that?  Especially when you feel tense, when you feel needy.  Opportunities were certainly all around and just as surely slipping through my fingers.  I was anxious, wanting to try but not to try ‘too hard’, and always feeling in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Roger Ebert and Steven Soderbergh were on the judging committee. I don’t remember ever even seeing them.

We had our packed screenings which seemed to go well and after them our Q&A’s where there were lots of questions.  People approached me afterwards, people with cards from companies I’d never heard of, saying they’d like to talk about distribution and television sales.  Naturally when I glanced down and saw that neither Sony Pictures Classics, Miramax or Orion Classics were on their cards, I'd smile politely, knowing that our film was destined for greater things.  Lea and her husband Dan Bonnell convinced me to leave Park City for twenty-four hours to go skiing at Powder Mountain and get our feet back on the ground.  When we returned to Park City, I went back to crash at the condo only to find someone else sleeping in my bed.  Hmm.  Sorry Mick Jagger, I’ll have to disagree with you here:  You can’t always get what you want, you get what you get.  

I left Park City for the airport without having talked distribution with anyone.  

(to be continued)

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Go Big or Go Bust: New Efficiency Model - It's the Tiny Little Actions (Part 4)

So I’ve dropped all semblance of an attempt to wrest control of the direction of this story and am going with the flow.  

It was the end of February of 1987 when we finished shooting the second half of How To Be Louise.  To my eye, the dailies were stunning.  The performances by Lea Floden and Bruce McCarty were beyond my wildest dreams.  The performances by the circle of friends they’d cast in the other roles were equally top-notch, friends like theatrical legends Maggie Burke and Lisa Emery, Mary Carol Johnson, Hollywood and tv regular Josh Pais, and Michael Patrick King (who went on to write, produce and direct Sex and the City, The Comeback and more). 

Lea Floden and Bruce McCarty in the scene about which The New York Post said: "This is very sexy."

Lisa Emery, Josh Pais and Steve Simpson

Josh Pais (dancing with himself in the mirror), Mary Carol Johnson and Lea Floden

Michael Patrick King and Alice Spivak on the steps of the WIlliamsburgh Savings Bank on Broadway near Peter Luger's

Maggie Burke

Our Director of Photography Vladimir Tukan had shot footage which itself had a power and beauty independent of the story.  Yes it was 16mm, but it was luminously rich black and white: Vladimir had studied cinematography in the classic old school tradition in Russia. He was passionately committed to this film, so much so that there were more than a few unforgettable moments when I had to put my foot down about the complexity of the camera moves.  In pre-production, we’d watched Bunuel’s Viridiana and The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz specifically for the long moving shots.  Vladimir was going to the mat to give me what I wanted, so much so that I once had to pull out all the stops and use tears to get him to agree to a simpler shot.

Along with the job he did shooting HTBL and Nadja Yet, I'll always be grateful to Vladimir for a life lesson he taught me as one artist to another.  Sometimes, in the heat of the moment of blocking and framing a shot, I'd lose my confidence and dismiss what I'd sketched out in a storyboard.  Vladimir would turn to me with the full force of his considerable personality:  "No!  Ehnn!"  (That's a phonetic spelling of my name with Vladimir's accent.) "Don't deesmiss your idea.  That comes from unconscious.  That's very valuable.  Let's see if we can do it."

Vladimir is on the left in profile. 

And we did.  And when we finished, it looked so good.  I realized that we weren’t just going to be able to have a babysitter, we’d be on Fifth Avenue with a nanny.  I got pregnant within the month.

While Walis Johnson assembled a rough cut, I wrote every person and grant organization I could get to, asking for money for post-production.  

Flash-forward three months: the production had run aground, out of money.  I painted the apartment and sewed curtains for every window in it.  Our downstairs neighbor Charles came up and commented to Mr. Green that I’d turned the place into a womb.  

One day, getting thick around the middle and out of breath trying to do a little yoga stretch, the full reality hit me: I’ve really done it this time, seriously shot myself in the foot.  I was exhausted and couldn’t even touch my toes.  How was I ever going to finish this film?  A voice in my head I didn’t know answered: “You’re on the right track.”  

And so I went back to taking the tiny little actions I could.  We got a very nice grant from The Jerome Foundation.  Amy Taubin wrote a profile piece for the Village Voice which a young man in Rockford, Illinois read and then sent us $5000.  And we got other donations including a big one from someone who seemed so cheap that I’d thought twice about wasting a postage stamp on him.  

We screened at what was then called the Independent Feature Project (IFP) in New York in October.  Ulrich Gregor of the Forum at the Berlin Film Festival ran at me after the screening:  “Are you the filmmaker?  I LOVE this film!”  A well-connected entertainment lawyer from Los Angeles told me to call him.  Jim Stark who had produced my favorite indie film Stranger Than Paradise stopped in to one of the screenings and gave a thumbs up:  “You’ve got something there.”  This was happening.

The sardonic and sometimes dark Philip Johnston started composing a score with his band The Happy New Yorkers and Kathleen Killeen worked on locking the picture.    

Ten weeks later, Frank Thurston Green was born.  Someone told me about a documentary filmmaker who gave birth to her first child on Sunday and went back to work on Monday.  The story made me wonder about both my commitment to film and her sanity.  My picture wasn’t locked, the sound was still to be edited, the score had to be recorded and laid in and I didn’t give a damn about any of it.  I was out of my mind with hormones and sleeplessness and falling madly in love with this chubby little baby.  

The next thing I remember was feeling irritated that my attempt to lay in the music (as if it were wall-to-wall carpet) had ruined the film.  Fortunately Mr. Green has a deep intuitive connection to storytelling and somehow knew how to cut in the score so it would amplify instead of flattening out the story.    

Soon after, we scheduled a sound mix with Dominick Tavella at Sound One.  As an assistant film editor, I’d been to many sound mixes, dreaming of the day when I’d be the director working with the mixer.  But as my passion for this baby was growing, so was my irritation at any distraction that could take me away from him.  Self-discipline pure and simple got me on the M train to the F train to midtown and the mix.  And then there was what I thought was ‘the last step’ of my job: submitting to film festivals.  Sundance and Berlin were at the top of our list.  

In the meantime, Mr. Green had been invited to spend six months as a guest professor at Osaka University in Japan.  Of course we would go with him.  But what if the film got into festivals?  Mr. Green and I agreed that we’d “work it out.”

Ulrich Gregor from Berlin’s Forum, who had professed love for our rough cut the year before, was the first to respond.  In a dagger to my heart, he let us know (by telegram, I think) that he wasn’t excited about the final film and had passed on it.  I was packing suitcases and chasing Frank, now an energetic nine-month old, as he crawled around the apartment terrorizing the cat.  Still there was no word from Sundance.  This was 1989, before email and cell phones and I was frantic that, off in a suburb of Osaka, I might never get word from Sundance or any of the other festivals we'd submitted to. 

The night before we left for Japan, I got the phone call from Sundance that they wanted How To Be Louise for the Dramatic Competition.  Soon after, Manfred Salzgeber, curator of the Berlin Festival’s Panorama, sent similarly good news.  

(to be continued)

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Go Big or Go Bust: New Efficiency Model - The Darkness Before the Dawn (Part 3)

Before continuing with this saga, I want to backtrack to explain the difficult beginnings of making my first feature, How To Be Louise, which was eventually invited to be in the Dramatic Competition at Sundance. To this workaholic, the astonishing fact is that it wasn’t effort but rather surrender which made it possible.

Lea Floden as Louise with (l. to r.) Michael Moneagle and William Zimmer

As a young artist in my twenties, I had a clarity that my life would be devoted to art.  I had no interest in being married and less than no interest in having children.  Anyone can see that children are a huge distraction not to mention expensive, noisy and so demanding that, unless you have a lot of help, you can forget about your own agenda.  Why would any woman with a dream shoot herself in the foot by having a baby, GOD FORBID more than one?  

And then I turned thirty.  Like a rogue wave, the biological desire to have children turned me upside down.  I decided to try to find a man.  And then one day, I surprised myself by flirting with a handsome guy who held the door for me as I walked into the wonderful artist-run restaurant that used to be on the corner of Prince and Wooster in Soho, FOOD.

Fast-forward to the year before we shot How To Be Louise, I was newlywed to Mr. Green, the man I’d met at FOOD.  Yes, I’d wanted this husband so I could have children with him but I dared to believe that if I could get my career going before having a baby, there would be enough money for help so that I could ‘have it all’: I could have a child and continue to pursue my dream of making indie films.

One May afternoon, en route to the post office to mail off a film to a film festival, Sara Driver and Jim Jarmusch crossed my path, their rolling luggage behind them.  They were headed to JFK to go to Cannes with Down By Law.  Not long after, I saw Spike Lee on the nightly news.  He was outside the theatre where his first feature She’s Gotta Have It was playing.  They were developing international reputations.  They were getting paid.  I decided that if I was ever going to turn filmmaking into a career and have children, I’d have to figure out how to make a feature.  

But I didn’t have any obvious source of funding much less the connections or the chutzpah to pitch: the budget for my feature would have to be on a shoestring.  My first two shorts had been inspired by What’s Up Tiger Lily and Rose Hobart: they were made by recutting rejected lab prints in the editing room where I worked.  I’d go back to that idea!  And I’d shoot some new material with an actor or two and intercut that to make sense of the found footage.  All I’d need was a few thousand dollars.

Louise Smells A Rat (1982) was made by duplicating a few shots from The Poppy Is Also a Flower starring Senta Berger and Trevor Howard and intercutting them with newsreel footage and a shot from Phil Silvers' Sergeant Bilko.  Original subtitles and music by Johnny Ventura made it into a different story.

There was a particularly discouraging afternoon when I took my place in line among scores of others to present my proposal for a measly $300 grant.  I’d brought my own projector, assembled a 16mm sample reel from rejected lab prints and faced what felt like disparaging and hostile questions from this Brooklyn arts organization.  

Soon after, reading in bed on a Sunday night, tears started leaking from my eyes.  I’m not a person who cries easily, but the steepness of the cliff I was trying to scale and the difficulty of the challenge was suddenly clear.  “What is it, Annie?”  I answered Mr. Green with sobs and more and louder sobs, eventually losing all control.  “What am I supposed to do?  Give up this idea of making a feature?  Should I try to get a job at an advertising agency and make a lot of money?  Or have a bunch of kids?  I can’t take it anymore!  I’m getting bitter!  I’m stuck!”  Mr. Green put his arm around me and I cried myself to sleep, confused.  I felt broken.  

And that night I had a dream that changed my life.  I was in a low-ceilinged kitchen right out of the 1950’s.  There was a witch in the kitchen, her hair was wild and she was intense, pointing a long skinny arm and finger off into the distance.  She was forceful: “Don’t stop now!  You’re almost there!”

I woke the next morning with a new confidence.  Suddenly I could take the big and little steps to get going.  And that message from the witch carried me through the next four years it took to make this film.  

As I write this, I’m still scratching my head over the fact that the power came to me after a total breakdown and surrender.  It was only after letting go of all my self-discipline, strength, force, will and control that I had the clarity and felt the confidence to do the job.  That it was in allowing myself to be overwhelmed by the utterly corny and embarrassing fact of ’feelings’ is a lesson I’m still trying to learn today.  (to be continued)  

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Go Big or Go Bust: New Efficiency Model - Comfort, Ease and Relaxation (Part 2)

Another word for my 'clenched fist and teeth approach to career success' might be 'control'. 

But before I get into that, I want to say that my intention was to wrap this post up in one, two entries at most.  For better or for worse, this piece seems to be extending itself.  In the spirit of my ‘New Efficiency Model’ (’relaxing’ and ‘taking it easy’ har har) it’s just going to have to unravel:

When I met and married the dynamic Mr. Green, I put all my chips on a man who valued honesty and the truth even more than he valued control.  His emotional honesty opened a door and made me feel alive in a way I never had.  It also made me feel safe with him.  Luckily I'd gotten some grants right around the time we met and so didn't have to report to a job.  It took virtually all that I had to come out from behind my shield and learn to get angry and vulnerable.  My old way would have been to act like a lady and bolt when the going got tough.  For the first time ever, I didn't do that. 

But after getting engaged, I did go to Cornelia Street to see Ralph Weston, an amazing astrologer whom my psychic friend Julia Wolfe had introduced me to.  I walked in the door saying: ”I don't THINK he's an axe murderer."  Ralph reassured me, knowing all kinds of things about Mr. Green that I hadn't told him and that we were the yin and the yang, that this was my man.  We married sixteen months and one day after we’d met.  

My friend Jayne was once describing Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne’s marriage on the reality show The Osbournes: “She’s always calling the cops on him and throwing him out.  Their marriage is very alive!”  I won’t say our marriage is at that level of ‘aliveness’ but Mr. Green continues to amuse, delight, surprise and occasionally infuriate me.  It’s exciting to be married to someone who has my number.  And it enforced a sense of security so great that it was one of my first non-substance-induced lessons in how to relax.  

Mr. Green liked to get up on a Sunday morning and make breakfast in a leisurely way.  He wasn’t afraid of getting lost in a book.  He started me on an unravelling that’s still going.  It’s very much related to relaxing and letting go and the opposite of taking a physical risk, something that has always come easily to me.  Sometimes I wonder if the adrenaline rush of risk-taking isn't the equivalent of a street drug.  It overwhelms the rational brain (already in handcuffs in my case) and it allows me to plunge into action before I've really had a chance to look into the details.

This is sort of what happened with going into production on my first feature film How To Be Louise with a big cast headed by Lea Floden and a huge crew headed by Vladimir Tukan.  With a $5000 NYFA prize, we started shooting what was supposed to be a trailer but ended up being the first forty minutes. 

Left to right: Kevin 'Killer' Smith (Key Grip), Bruce McCarty (co-star), Deirdre Fishel (Production Manager), Elena _____ (Second Asst. Camera), Vladimir Tukan (Dir. of Photography), me, _____, ______, Carol Guidry (Production Sound Mixer), Jacquelyn Coffee (Script Supervisor)  PHOTO BY Warner Dick

The conditions were difficult in the blazing humid heat of August and the bone-cracking cold of February and the work was hard.  But the people in the cast and crew were Great.  (Most of the people…  There was that make-up person (soon ‘released’) who clucked and moaned as she made up one of the actors: “Such small eyes!”.)  It was an experience of working with a team where everyone was doing it for love.  There was the love of indie filmmaking, the love of working with people you learn from and have fun with and the love of making something happen out of almost nothing, where your contribution is absolutely necessary and valuable. There was lots and lots of positive energy and even a romance or two behind the scenes.  For someone who had started off wanting to be an artist in a garret, alone alone, this huge collaborative effort was completely new territory.

on the far right is Lea Floden who played Louise, Mary Carrol Johnson who played Louise's best friend has her back to the camera.  I'm pained that I don't remember the name of the young woman holding the slate.  Neil Danziger is the boom standing above us.  PHOTO BY Warner Dick

Knowing as little as I did about directing actors or working with a crew, it might not come as a surprise that I started sleepwalking during the shoot.   Mr. Green woke me one night as I was standing at our window in the light of the streetlight, holding an imaginary clipboard in my hand and trying to communicate with Vladimir the DP whom I imagined was working on the street below. 

Two steps forward, five steps back.  It’s not easy to let go of the fear that tells you you can’t let go… even in your sleep.  (to be continued)

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Go Big or Go Bust: New Efficiency Model - Comfort, Ease and Relaxation (Part 1)

I grew up way out in the country in a family with a good solid Puritan work ethic.  My father was away half the time earning a living as a pilot for TWA.  My mother was busy keeping us (five girls) clean and fed.  In her spare time, she sewed us identical velvet party dresses with lace trim.  

I'm in the back row on the right.

We had chores, taking out the garbage, feeding the dog, and of course, for most of the year, we had homework.  All of my sisters did really well (you could actually say they ‘excelled’) at school.  They got prizes, they got into the best colleges in the country.  All except me.  The fact is that I had issues.

Every September as far back as I can remember, I’d resolve that this year would be different.  I’d sharpen my pencils, I’d write my name in all my notebooks.  I was going to do a really good job at ‘my most important job'.  But for some reason, I just couldn’t hold still long enough. I hated sitting in classrooms. I’d fall asleep as soon as I opened a book. And, easily frustrated, I’d take a break from homework and somehow, forget to get back to it.

For years it seemed that I’d gotten by on charm.  Just recently, it became clear that maybe it wasn’t charm at all, that maybe the fact that I’d ‘just squeaked by with a 65’ in every Algebra, Latin and science course was collusion among the teachers: they realized that I was basically ineducable and simply pushed me along.

My plan had always been to get a job as a flight attendant for TWA until my father came home with the devastating news that he’d checked the requirements and that I was too tall. The terror (not too strong a word) of spending the rest of my days as a file clerk wearing pantyhose in a fluorescent-lit office motivated me to notch up my ‘study habits’.  Maybe it was at this point that a switch flipped and alarm bells sounded.  The future was nipping at my heels and it didn’t feel safe or friendly.  

I began to incorporate anxiety into my being the way some people take vitamins.  I kept myself on a short leash, trying very hard.  

By the end of college, weary of all the memorization, I decided to cast my lot with the one thing that seemed fun and to come easily, drawing.  Part of the deal was to never let go of the awareness (anxiety) that very few artists manage to make a living with their art. I’d have to keep my expenses at rock bottom in order to be able to carve out a life I could bear to live.  

The clenched-fist-and-teeth approach to career success carried me through pretty much to this Summer.  (to be continued)

Go Big or Go Bust: Sino-Korean détente right under my nose (and deviated septum)

When I saw my doctor last week, seventeen days after an operation to fix the inside of my ’10% top worst case’ noses, this taciturn, arrogant and somewhat cold perfectionist with a slight Korean accent was (unusually) smiling from ear to ear.  

After examining what I’ve come to think of as the subway system of my face, he pronounced “You are wayyyy ahead of schedule!  The nose is eighty to ninety percent healed!  Of course sinuses are a little behind.”  And then, practically shouting: “Look at that, on the left.  You could drive a truck through there!”

I don’t think he’s aware of you, my online cheering squad, sending a tsunami of good wishes.  You people are at least partly responsible for this rapid recovery … and I THANK YOU!!!

The funny thing is, at 7:34PM on the day of the ‘dissection’ (he called it that…hello high school biology) I was lying at home in bed, ‘still somewhat loopy’ according to Mr. Green, but sharp enough to notice the time and the fact that, instead of the two little slits I’ve been accustomed to breathing through, my nose felt like it had been replaced by the grill of a 1966 Plymouth Fury.  (Having an apparently ‘A’ type personality, the good doctor threw “opening up all eight sinuses” into the bargain.)  

The massive inrush of oxygen continues to surprise me and the fact that breathing is so easy has, in moments, actually concerned me -  like maybe in his zeal this guy wiped out the filter we’re supposed to have to keep out bugs and leaves.  

Of course there’s the issue of the soundtrack to my inner life.  Along with that blasted inner-voice, now there’s an element straight out of Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau - my own somewhat noisy, slow and regular deep breathing.  Of course I keep hearing old Jacques’ narration in his “I told you so” voice.  (“We knew there was a chance we’d run into a school of man-eating piranhas and there they were!”)

So it should come as no surprise that the core of my being is now extrapolating on this novel experience of getting a big breath in without any effort at all, : “Hey, maybe we don’t have to try so hard at every other darn thing!”

Terry, who’s been cutting my hair for the past thirty-five plus years, has often signed off with: “Have fun with it!” a line that’s always irritated me.  Naturally I don’t let on but inside I’m all:  “FUN with it??  Who are you talking to??  I don’t have time for FUN.  And certainly not with my HAIR.”  

Well, the humbling inflicted on me by this ‘ordeal’ has a silver lining: I’m grateful to be able to have ‘fun’.  I do what I have to do, have as much fun as I can and call it a day.  My expectations are way down.

And my gratitude is up. 

This may be some kind of secret of life.  Thank you so very much for bolstering me along the way.   <3 <3 <3     (Click the 'Like' button under this post for a nice surprise.) 

There'll be a new post here every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Go Big or Go Bust: About That Emotional Striptease I Was Doing

I'm going to get back into it Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays starting on Monday.  Right here.  Be here or be squere.

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 254 (about returning to the front after surgery on a deviated septum and eight sinuses)

So here’s what you can see of my ‘ordeal’: 

(It looks exactly the same as it always did.)

The big deal is not the nose which just had its internal walls ‘rearranged’ - it’s the sinuses.  My wonderful (if completely mad) surgeon went in and ‘opened up’ all EIGHT sinuses.  The massive inrush of all this oxygen is almost disorienting-- in a good way. The only problem is a persistent
sinus headache which makes looking at a screen not fun - hence my delayed and gradual return.  

I haven’t had the nerve to ask the doctor (he doesn’t have what I’d call a very ‘strong’ sense of humor) if I’m his fastest recovery ever but if your well-wishing in my Facebook feed counts for all that I'm imagining it does, I probably am.

Thank you for your amazing show of support.  It’ll take me a while to get around to visit and reply but you’re already in my heart.

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 239 (report)

This is Anne's husband. The surgery was a success. Thank you all for your good wishes.

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 238 (on hammer time ... or actually it's knife time)

I think I’ve mentioned (what’s been referred to as) my ‘sporty’ childhood which involved a lot of time upside down, walking on hands, cartwheels, etc.  After breaking my nose twice, a doctor tried to straighten out my deviated septum with a metal rod, apparently almost perforating the septum in the process.  Regardless of whatever good he may have done for my nose, I promptly went and stopped a field hockey ball with it soon after.

Hey, I breathe just fine through my mouth.  It’s the sinus infections which have been getting to me.

So tomorrow I’m going under the knife.  The plan is to correct a top 10% worst case deviated septum.  I’m unhappy to report that the doctor who’ll be holding the knife rated the operation in the top 1% for difficulty and so am trying to repress the fear factor.  All the action will be right around the eyes and the brain.  

If I’m unfit for the job, Mr. Green will post an update tomorrow.  I hope to be back to this blog soon but from what I've heard, might have to take a break.  Taking you all with me into the operating room.   Thanks for being here!

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 237 (on how, in this case, it takes more than a village)

This is a very tricky thing to do because there's always the chance (the likelihood) that in the hurry to get this out, someone important is not included.  Oh no I've just thought of two important people!!!  

Forging ahead,  this token of my heartfelt thanks is to my professional (non-actor) inner circle of women without whom I would be chewing off my nails and blinking very fast, very possibly alone behind a warehouse somewhere.  Thank you for being role models, for your kindness and your generosity with your time and your knowledge and your encouragement.  It's in large part because of you that I'm daring to go through with this mad attempt to leap to the next level.  

So thank you my dear friends!   (In case you're curious about these wonderful women, check out the links below the picture.)

Campbell, Molly Duncan
Convery, Ann
Earle, Danielle
Goa, Anita
Imig, Ann
James, Veronica
Lavoie, Mudd
Lefler, Anna
Mase, Marla
Miller, Susan
Morrison, Mhairi
O’Grady, Marion
Perr, Janet
Pushkine, Tanya
Rick, Barbara
Rosas, Alexandra
Shubert, Julie Clark
Siniawsky, Susan
Soro, Suzy                                                                         Emily Spray
Tibaldi, Katie
Trestrail, Victoria  

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Go Big or Go Bust: Day 236 (on social media for the socially challenged and advice from Feather and Toast's Holly Payberg, Glossi Girl's Stephen Dimmick and Mudd Lavoie)

With two twitter accounts, two facebook, two instagram, one tumblr, two youtube, a Seed&Spark, Vproud, vimeo, stumbleupon, pinterest, reddit, linkedin, ello, digg, myspace, metacafe, daily motion and more, you'd think I have A) an army of interns B) the body of Kali or C) mental health issues. 

The answer is D) None of the above.  I'm simply a misguided and exhausted producer trying to get some traction.  

When we started making The Louise Log, I'd upload an episode to youtube and send the link to my address book.  If people are interested, I figured, they'll watch. 

Sometime in 2008, groaning that there wasn't time for the rabbit hole of facebook, I joined up only to be browbeaten (thank you Mary Jander) into getting onto twitter.  And so began my life on social media.

Only thing, I have this little issue with being a workaholic and was treating all this like 'media', forgetting about the 'social'.  In real life I have friends, none of whom I see enough of anyway cause if you're a control freak making a low-budget web series, you basically don't have time to sleep. 

My habit was to, once a month, post the links to the new episodes and call it a day.  Sure I'd talk back to people who talked to me if I happened to notice, but my attitude was that all these social media sites were billboards, places to put up the videos.  The 'social' aspect of it seemed like icing on the cake, fine for the teenagers who had nothing better to do than avoid doing their homework.  I was busy being my own production studio.   

My dear old friend Stephen Dimmick advised me (in his gorgeous Australian accent): "Anne, it's a converSAtion." My coach and advisor Mudd Lavoie encouraged me (to the point of hoarseness) to talk to people on facebook and twitter for at least fifteen minutes every day.  "You can't find half an hour??" And the answer to this day, I say red and shamefaced, more often than not, is 'not always'. 

I intend to!  I've even come around to wanting to.  At this point, I know a lot of not only cool but generous and amazing people through social media.  People I've never met.  People whose work I love and admire.  And believe me, I want to have started this new program of being active on social media yesterday (naturally).

The problem comes down to three issues: poor impulse control, difficulty with transitions and an inability to let go/perfectionism.  Whatever the job is, this blog, yesterday's photo shoot, a phone conversation --  even with my little egg timer ringing, with the alarm on the phone going off, the days get away from me almost every day.  Whatever activity I'm involved in, I'm 'finishing it up'.  And then it's past bed time. 

Holly Payberg of the wonderful web series Feathers and Toast wrote a very clear and smart step-by-step approach to succeeding on social media this week.  I recommend that you read it.  And having now bared my soul about my anti-social social media behavior, am hoping I will change tomorrow once and for all.  Tonight, even!  Crossing my fingers.    

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 235 (on our photo shoot with Everett Quinton, Jay Patterson, Janet Perr, Larry Bercow and Nika De Carlo)

We did a promotional photo shoot today with a group so creative, so focused on the work and so completely unhinged that when Mr. Green stopped in to make himself a quick sandwich, he feared a fist fight was about to break out in the living room.  The effort was to further the 'Go Big or Go Bust' agenda and I am blasted with tiredness.  Here are some shots from lunch:

L to R the incomparable Jay Patterson, the man of the hour Everett Quinton and the lovely triple threat Nika De Carlo

Ironic (or tricky) that the super talented and very generous photographer Larry Bercow was sitting in a way that I couldn't get a good picture of him. 

L to R Nika De Carlo with the legendary Art Director Janet Perr whose album package for Cyndi Lauper's 'GIrls Just Wanna Have Fun' won a Grammy.

Then, like normal people taking care of themselves (not), Mr. Green and I jumped in the car and fought our way through bumper to bumper traffic all the way up to the George Washington Bridge.  Just for fun, we continued north for another four hours.  But who's counting. 

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 234 (on walking in NYC, getting off my high horse and learning to be a pedestrian among pedestrians)

Walking is one of my favorite ways to get around New York City.  For the distances I don't have time to walk, you'll find me on the subway.  And the same was true for Paris when I lived there as a student.  Maybe because I have big eyes, a lot of nervous energy and am a slooow reader, walking has always been my favorite form of education (and exercise).  And I like to walk alone, in a bubble, like a visiting Martian, safe and invisible. 

La Maison du Croque Monsieur on East 13th Street    I <3 NYC

But it feels like my relationship to walking around New York City is becoming a different kind of education.  And I suspect that this change has something to do with the breaking down of my self-containment in the writing of this blog.

When I first moved to New York, I felt slapped in the face by everyone I passed.  Being a country girl, I looked people in the eye and had a smile all ready for 'Good morning!'  But person after person walked right past me without even a glance my way.  I was stunned by the coldness.  I even took it personally.  What happened to manners?  It didn't take long for me to put up my own wall and be as cool as everybody else. 

Mr. Green (a native) once remarked that New Yorkers aren't unfriendly, they just don't want to waste time.  If you want directions, people will give them to you, but they might not stop moving as they do.  New Yorkers are also real.  They don't fake 'nice'.  Can you imagine saying "Good morning!" (with feeling) to the hundreds of people you pass before 9 AM?

Today, rushing around doing errands under my skimpy umbrella, a woman I've seen around the neighborhood for decades crossed my path.  She's probably fifteen years younger than I am and I've never known her name.  Whenever I see her, we smile, nod or say hello,.  And we keep walking.  There's something vulnerable about her which has always made me nervous.  Today when she said hello, I stopped.  We talked for ten minutes and, to my surprise, it left me feeling more free.  It felt like I'd overcome a fear which I hadn't even been aware had been ruling me.  Could it be that because I'm accepting the possibility of my own vulnerability that I could let her in?

Connecting with someone, getting down off my high horse and being a pedestrian among pedestrians is a risk I don't generally take.  Sure, I'll give directions to tourists, but to get into a conversation with someone who I'm going to be running into all the time is a commitment.  "I've got too many friends already!  The next thing you know she'll be asking for a favor!"  Today these voices didn't even dare to come out of their holes. 

Talking frankly here and hearing that you identify is a powerful force pushing me in the direction of taking risks and expanding.  I thank you for that.

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 233 (on process, insomnia, extreme AC and the amazing Marie Forleo)

I’ve been out and about living the dream.  Tonight that meant riding the NYC subway system and I figured you’d want to see me navigating an MTA tunnel. 

Unfortunately, the cars of the trains are so overly air-conditioned that you need a sweater while you're traveling.  But, as the saying goes, what goes around, comes around and the hot air from these cars is vented onto the platforms. Waiting for the next train, I felt in danger of being poached standing up.  But I digress.

Tonight brings me to the fingernails-on-the-blackboard subject of ‘process’.  I’m so into results and finished products, I practically break out in a rash if someone wants to talk about ‘process’.  Trusted reader, why are you not surprised.

Anyway, this trying to take The Louise Log to the next level is nothing if not a process.  My usual way of wanting it all finished yesterday simply doesn’t work.  Yes it makes me hysterical.  Yes it throttles my anxiety up and off the charts.  Yes I’m up until 2AM tossing and turning and driving Mr. Green ‘cray cray’ (he would hate that expression and I’m taking a certain pleasure in using it).  The fact is, I’m a nervous wreck.  

And guess what comes across my computer screen?

The solution to all my problems!  

The ‘Crazy Simple Stress-Busting Tool You’re Not Using (Yet)’

If you’ve never met Marie Forleo, you’re in for a pleasant surprise.  Oh come on I’ll say it right out: Get ready to fall in love.  There's even a free download for those of you into stationery porn.  OH yeah. 

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 231 (on Everett Quinton, Amy Winehouse, Drop Dead Perfect and success)

Mr. Green and I went to see AMY tonight, the documentary about Amy Winehouse and a sobering meditation on the perils of success and media attention in this day and age.

It’s interesting to find myself in the situation of needing and wanting exactly this double-edged sword of success, the very thing which makes it possible to raise money and greenlight projects but which can apparently become a curse.  

Maybe I’m deluding myself, but I’d like to think that my thirty odd years in the trenches have sufficiently grounded me so that I would weather whatever storms success might bring.  

And then, I happened on wonderful news of a fresh success for someone who has known well-deserved success for decades and wears it well:

Everett Quinton in The Louise Log #41                  Photo by Karen Sanderson

Everett Quinton, the delightfully difficult father-in-law to Louise in Season 3, is killing it Off-Broadway.  Not only did The New York Times name Drop Dead Perfect a Critic’s Pick, they singled out its star and gave credit where credit is due:

Thank you Everett for showing us all that a person can continue to be a stellar, generous and sane human being in spite of having his (her) name in lights.  I can’t wait to see you in this.  Congratulations!!

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 230 (Janet Perr, designer of Cyndi Lauper's first album cover, and new video thumbnails)

Today I spent a couple of hours walking by the Hudson with Janet Perr, a friend from the (sometimes dark and lonely) days when our kids were in Kindergarten together.  Who knew that old Janet had had designed an album cover one for the Rolling Stones, that amazing cover for Cyndi Lauper's first (incredible) album and that Janet even won a Grammy for album cover design!

Oddly enough, I'm up to my neck in my own design project.  Using everything Mhairi told me to do plus whatever I've been able to learn from studying popular web series thumbnails (the tiny posters for videos online are called 'thumbnails') I'm in the midst of redoing all the thumbnails for all three seasons.  Whaddaya think?  (I'm seriously open to comment and suggestions.)

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 229 (Getting over the No-Pain-No-Gain mentality and having some Fun with Julie Clark Shubert)

I still remember the morning thirty odd years ago when my dear old dad, who had choked down Shredded Wheat for breakfast for much of his life, learned that this cereal was virtually devoid of nutritional value.  "I figured anything that tasted that bad must be good for you!"  It seems that I've managed to incorporate his "no pain, no gain" fixation: I generally feel most comfortable killing myself with work. 

So it was with complicated feelings that I decided to seize the opportunity to have some fun and hangout with a musician who has been more than generous in letting me use her song in my videos.  The irrepressible Julie Clark Shubert (whose wonderful song "I Want To Know You" is the soundtrack to this video about The GypsyNesters must-read book) is in town.

Soon after Julie arrived, we set off and have been walking and talking all day.  First stop was to visit Louise Log musician and Etsy star Emily Spray's table at a street fair where Julie scored a hat:

We then headed downtown to give Julie a taste of Soho and Little Italy, ending up in Chinatown where we took a break for a lunch of Chow Fun at Hop Kee followed by foot massages.:

In spite of my protests that the sun was in the wrong place for a picture, Julie insisted on this shot with the Hudson River at the 3.5 mile mark.

We made it back to my place in what Google Maps calculated as 3.9 miles.  OH yeah.  And Julie's just announced that 'cooking and dancing' is next on the agenda.  I want to rally.  I want to be a good sport.  My only anxiety is that I may miss dinner, fast asleep in bed.  Fun is exhausting. 

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 228 (The Power of Less invades the living room)

It may be a further effect of this ban on multi-tasking that my mind is suddenly a whole lot quieter.  And in a shocking and abrupt shift, I've become physically unable, for even a minute, to accept the clutter of decades.  Pictures are coming down off the walls, furniture is on the block (as in 'executioner's block').  Looking at YOU unpainted wooden bookcase (on the left) that doesn't make it to the ceiling.

Do you have any idea of how long I've wanted to deal with this claustrophobic situation? That it's all happening without much of a plan, effortlessly, like a snake shedding a skin it's outgrown astonishes me.  And it proves to me without a doubt that the physical world is indeed a manifestation of thought and feeling. 

The only picture I could find of the living room which shows the piano (partially obscured but highlighted) is from the shoot of Season 3.  (L to R Danusia Trevino, Everett Quinton, Jennifer Sklias-Gahan, Kira Cecilia, me, The Piano, Chris Leone)    Photo by Karen Sanderson

The living room tonight on its way to a new zen state it hasn't known for decades.  I'll keep you posted.  

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 227 (The life and death stakes of moving our piano, efficiency mania, The Power of Less, living with an open heart and the meaning of Going Big)

So, finally getting back to finishing the story about the monster truck that creamed our car ... and just so you have all the facts, it was not a five-inch scratch as reported but a good ten-inch crease.  I measured it this morning. 

But I want to sidetrack for just a minute in order to give the truck story its full due.

We have a friend who prides himself on being able to cram three 30 gallon cans of garbage into one 30 gallon garbage bag (lotta jumping).  With my efficiency obsession, this is a practice I heartily admire but it's a bit of a painful reminder of my own attitude toward time. 

I know how to cram at least 36 hours into 24: cut back on sleep, cut out all pleasure and non-essentials and multi-task like a maniac.  A guy once asked me if I was doing something else while we were on the phone.  "Of course." I told him, unabashed.  "I'm doing the dishes.  I'm a mother!  I'm always doing at least two things at once.  Though I draw the line at vacuuming and talking on the phone."  (He never called again.)

So everybody's heard of 'eating lunch at your desk'.  I assumed that that meant that you chewed while you kept on working.  Apparently, that's not necessarily the case.  I used to eat breakfast and lunch at my desk work work working right through.  Only shame and guilt (and lack of an impending deadline) crow-barred me away from the office to cook and sit at the dinner table with Mr. Green.  

But for the past month, because of The Power of Less (thank you Victoria Trestrail!), except for a handful of reversions to my bad old ways, I've taken to eating in company or eating as a meditation.  There's no reading, no radio, no working - just chewing and enjoying the food.  And this is having a radical effect on my life.  I have a sense of ease and a sense of peace that there's enough time.  I even think I have a growing sense of confidence and joy, all from this incredibly simple change.

So to get back to the Confrontation While Alternate Side Parking story, it's in large part because of my new zen-ed out state (my awareness that I will go as 'big' as I'm supposed to while doing only one thing at a time) that I had an extraordinary experience that day.  It also involves a piano. 

Remember Ava throwing herself on the piano? 

Well once upon a time, children around this house practiced on that piano and it got a lot of use.  Now that they've grown up and are off living far away, this massive, dark piece of furniture is parked right in the middle of the apartment sort of blocking the door, totally crowding the place and looking to me like a huge Black Widow Spider -- and why?  I threatened Mr. Green that I was going to find someone to move the piano and shopped for a good bargain.  And then on one of those 93º humid days, three guys came to do the herculean job of getting this massive thing down to the floor below.

In former times, I think I would have been in my office working away, busy as a bee, while they moved the piano.  I would have figured, hey, they're professionals, why would I be there?  But because of breaking this habit of trying to cram 48 hours into 24, it was clear to me that I should be there.  And as it turned out, I'm so glad I was. 

The piano couldn't make it down the narrow turn at the head of the stairs so the only alternative was 'the long way'.  The long and perilous way.  It had to go out the kitchen door and down the steps of a wooden deck.  But until they got the piano out on it, I hadn't realized that this deck had not been built to withstand the weight of three big guys and a massively built, fifty-one inch tall piano. 

Neither had I realized how much communication and negotiation goes into moving a piano. The stakes are very high for every lift so they were constantly bargaining with each other on what the next move would be. 

And meanwhile, the deck and the stairs down to the garden were acting like they were chopsticks or toothpicks, not two-by-fours.  There were cracking and splintering sounds, the deck was shuddering, wobbling like a hammock and seemed to pull away from the building.  To counteract visions of the whole platform separating from the house and throwing them and the piano into the garden, I used my 'white light' technique (which is no technique at all ... seeing circles of white) ... and praying.  They were hard-working guys.  They wanted to get the job done.   More than once, back in the kitchen, they had asked, "You really sure you want this piano downstairs?"  They wanted to please me.  They also definitely wanted the money for the job.  Did they realize how dangerous it all was?  They could feel the deck shuddering, hear the wood splintering.  I stepped back into the kitchen figuring I could at least avoid being the 'straw' that broke the camel's back.  Mostly I prayed. 

When they were about half way through this torturous job, off the deck and stairs but approaching the steep narrow stone steps down to the house, they took a break and I became aware of a loud chorus of horns filling the air.  One of the guys asked me (my hands were free) to go check and see if their truck was blocking traffic.

Running to the front windows, I saw trouble and called for one of them to move their truck.  The truck that had creamed our car the day before was, ironically, stuck right behind the piano truck and the rest of the block was paralyzed.  Angry drivers were out of their cars and a traffic cop was writing a ticket.  I had my Wonder Woman moment with the driver (see blog, Day 225) and thanked the cop for not giving the piano truck a ticket.  "Oh I gave him a ticket."  I asked for how much ($65) and when I told the piano guy, he almost broke down.  "Oh GOD!  This city!  It'll kill you!  You try to make a buck, there's no where to park!  Sixty-five dollars??"

Here this guy, not a young man, had been putting every ounce of himself, possibly risking his life, into the brutal job of moving our piano.  I'd noticed when he'd first arrived that he walked with a very heavy step, that his body seemed to be carrying a huge weight even when he carried nothing at all.  And because I'd been right with him during the move, living through every inch of the piano's journey, I was with him with my heart wide open: "I'll pay the ticket."  I didn't look at him but felt his mood shift instantly.  We walked and found a spot, checked it out with the traffic cop and went back to finish the job.  

I'm wondering if this experience of feeling the physical courage and vulnerability and then the financial difficulties and finally love for these piano movers was equally if not even more powerful than my Wonder Woman moment. 

As far as 'going big', is it possible that this is the definition (actually) of what it means to 'go big'?  Daring to live with your heart open, vulnerable, daring to feel with your fellow man - taking your eye off your particular prize.  And here if I'd been at my desk, I would have missed this whole experience, this extraordinary joy.